


hale aikāne

by Siria



Category: Hawaii Five-0 (2010)
Genre: Episode Tag, Episode: s02e05 Ma'ema'e (Clean), Gen, POV Character of Color, POV Female Character
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-11-07
Updated: 2011-11-07
Packaged: 2017-10-25 19:51:34
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,403
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/274109
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Siria/pseuds/Siria
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Slowly, deliberately, Kono rubbed the sole of her left foot back and forth against the step.</p>
            </blockquote>





	hale aikāne

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks to Cate and Jenn for betaing!

Slowly, deliberately, Kono rubbed the sole of her left foot back and forth against the step. The brick was gritty and cool and grounding against her skin, a welcome distraction from the still-throbbing pain in her arm and the hollow-eyed feeling that came from not getting enough sleep. She'd come back here last night fully intending to fall into bed, to burrow underneath her sheets and not get up for a week, but the house had still smelled like Delano and his goons: cigarette ash and stale alcohol, aftershave masking sweat. For a long moment, Kono's palms had itched with the urge to throw something breakable against the wall, finish what Fryer and Delano had started the moment they’d walked into her home, but settled instead for methodically stripping the house—bed sheets, cushion covers, pillowcases, curtains—and throwing them into the washing machine at the hottest possible setting. She'd cleaned, jaw set so hard it ached, until the house gleamed and it was past four in the morning, but every time she took a breath, phantom smoke still burned the back of her throat.

She'd made a cup of tea and taken it outside. From her perch on the front step, she watched as four became five became six, and dawn was a pale, watercolor-wash against the sky. She sipped at the tea, let the cup's warmth seep into the fine bones of her hands, and tried very hard to think of nothing in particular. The ends had justified the means, after all; she'd told herself that from the beginning, and for Chin, for Auntie and Uncle, for Danny and Steve, she'd offer herself up again, if that was what it took. It was what she’d been raised to do; the lesson she’d learned from those around her who’d always tried to carry themselves straight-backed, with honor. She just wished it hadn't left her with something huge and weighty lodged behind her breastbone—something that felt a lot like grief, like a mourning for the things lost in the desperate attempt to keep what was hers.

Round about six fifteen, she was scrubbing at her eyes with the heels of her palms, contemplating heading inside for a shower before she started on the paperwork needed for her official reinstatement, when she heard the sound of a familiar engine. She looked up to see Danny climb out of the Camaro and bustle towards her, looking more like a businessman who'd just finished a day at the office than a cop heading into work—the top two buttons on his shirt were undone, his hair was rumpled as if starting to break free from that gel he used, and he had a large paper sack tucked in the crook of his arm.

"Hey," he said, without any other preamble, as if they’d seen one another every day for the past several weeks; as if it was just the other night he was over here for a beer after a hectic case. "So, I wasn't sure which are your favorites or if you were in the mood for something in particular—I often am, breakfast can be picky that way—so I got you some green tea cocoa puffs, some malasadas, couple of Danish, some doughnuts, though minus one because I got peckish on the way over, sorry, traditional cop breakfast." He sat down next to her on the step, started rummaging through the sack and produced some of the pastries, some napkins, two travel flasks of coffee.

"Danny—" Kono sighed, feeling her grip tighten around her cup until her knuckles stood out in bleached relief. She didn’t know if she was in the mood for this—if she wanted to hear someone skirt awkwardly around the topic, pretend that neither of them had ever been disappointed in the other, she’d go inside and call her dad.

Danny held up a hand. "And before you say anything else, this is both in completely inadequate and partial apology _and_ in recognition of the fact that grocery shopping isn't high up on the approved activities of rookie cops gone rogue, so if you're not able to accept the former just yet, you can at least take these in the spirit of the latter." This close, Danny looked exhausted, too; there were dark circles under his eyes, stubble blunting the edge of his jaw. Kono wondered if he'd been sleeping much, either.

"Danny." It was hard to speak around the lump in her throat. Kono settled for putting her teacup down beside her, picking at a ragged piece of cuticle on her left thumb. She’d always prided herself on meeting trouble head on, on walking into any given situation with her head held high, but right now she was struggling to make herself meet Danny’s eyes. "You don't have to—"

"No, no, wait, hold on, are you kidding me?" Danny said gently, tone somehow made even more forceful by the lack of his usual volume. "Yes, I absolutely have to apologize, this is—I should have pushed harder, I should have said something to Chin about those times you didn't return my calls, I should have asked Steve _what the hell_." He paused, pulled a face, took a drag of his coffee. "Not that I don't frequently ask McGarrett _what the hell_ , in the movie of my life that's probably the catch phrase, the man makes me at least seventy six different kinds of crazy, but this is not my point. My point is, I fucked up. I got all caught up in the"—he twirled a finger in mid-air—"you know, the whatever, with Rach and the kid and everything else, and I should have stopped and said hey, hey, what do you need."

"It's fine," Kono said quietly, "it was better for my cover, anyway." In the small hours of the morning, walking up the path to her house with her arms wrapped around herself against the night’s chill, she’d worked to convince herself of the truth of that—sought the advantage in feeling angry that she was fighting for them, but that none of them seemed willing to fight for her; that every time she’d seen Chin, she was sure she’d seen no trust in his eyes, just disappointment.

Danny snorted. "Screw the cover," he said, gently bumping his shoulder against hers. "This is not... look. You did what you felt you had to do, and I respect that, honest. Not a lot of people could put themselves in harm's way like you did, for that long, with no one to turn to. You did good, rookie, but a little more focus on what's good for you, okay? Since I think we can both agree that Fryer and his dumbass vendetta can go fuck himself sideways, and the rest of that stuff is just, pfft."

His hands fluttered as if brushing away all the terrible loneliness of the past several weeks, and for the first time in longer than she could properly remember, Kono felt herself smile. It hurt her cheeks, a little, but she was glad—the ache was as grounding in its own way as was the scrape of concrete against her toes, the cool breeze against her skin. "Thanks," she said. "For breakfast. And for the other stuff."

"You're welcome," Danny told her, his eyes crinkling up at the corners, his smile tentative but warm. He leaned in to her a little; let Kono rest her weight against his shoulder before wrapping his arms around her. He was steady, steadying; Kono could smell his aftershave, the wrinkled cotton of his shirt warm against her cheek. Salt water prickled at her eyes and the breath that shuddered out of her made her ribs ache.

After a long moment, Danny said softly, “You want to talk about it?”

Kono thought, nodded; bit her lip and nodded again, more to herself than to Danny. She began to speak, hearing words tumble free that she hadn’t known had been stoppered up behind her lips. Danny sat silent, let her speak until there was nothing more to say; until the marrow-deep exhaustion she felt came more from something finished than from something left unsaid.

“Okay,” Danny said when she was done, “okay,” squeezed her a little tighter; and the two of them sat together for a long time more, watching the sun come up over the mountains.


End file.
